We’ve all heard the age-old adage, “He who has the gold makes the rules.” According to the Federal Election Commission, Barack Obama raised $155.4 million more than Mitt Romney for this presidential election (“Campaign,” 2012). The results of the election will illustrate whether this rule still holds true. If Obama wins, we might just chalk it up to the fact that money has become a kind of weather vane in American politics.
Several variables contribute to a winning campaign. According to Kai Ryssdal (2012) of Marketplace, the more popular a candidate becomes, the more funding he or she attracts. However, several studies suggest that the funding actually causes popularity. According to many scholarly sources, increased spending significantly affects the vote share each candidate receives come election time (Nagler & Leighley, 1992).
Obama has the money angle covered, as he is spending much more to win the election than Romney, but another very important variable in politics seems to be who comes out looking best amid all the mudslinging. On September 2, 2012, Romney and Obama were tied in the polls. The disclosure of a secret Romney fundraiser speech seemed well-timed indeed. Just as Obama regained a lead after the tie on September 2, a damning video was released by an anonymous source and circulated on the Internet. How conveniently Obama mastered yet another electoral variable.
Romney’s latest faux pas arrived Monday, September 17th, 2012 with the questionable “secret video” footage circulating on YouTube, and the debacle has made national headlines. Romney makes a blatant sweeping generalization in this video, characterizing many Obama voters as people who feel they are “entitled” to government support, claiming that most of “them” don’t even pay income taxes. He continually refers to himself as one of “us” as he regails his wealthy audience with tales from a visited Chinese factory.
The video will most likely damage Romney’s popularity, which will cause a dip in the polls. As Romney is already far behind Obama in funds availability, this may be a blow from which his campaign cannot recover. Further, though Romney might have been concerned with speaking to a specific audience, the video seems shady. Most of the statements Romney makes in the video seem to be taken out of a larger context. No images are apparent in most of the footage, and the source remains unknown because Mother Jones, who broke the story, wishes “to protect the confidential source who provided the video” (Corn, 2012). With this stroke, the Obama Campaign scored a definite point.
This video came from YouTube, and though the film quality is not as good as the one from the Mother Jones website, the footage from each portion of the leaked video is combined here. Watch the leaked footage below:
While Mother Jones vouches for the video’s authenticity, claiming that the fundraiser occurred on May 17, 2012 at the Boca Raton home of Marc Leder, the entire video hasn’t been released. This could occur if the person filming the video had a limited amount of storage space for data on the device used. However, this video could also be part of a smear campaign against Romney.
Either way, we all know politicians fight dirty. One can’t blame Romney. No one plays politics like people from Chicago. Whether the video release was planned or the Obama Campaign simply pounced when opportunity presented itself, Romney should just admit the truth. Obama possesses superior fundraising, politicking, and schmoozing skills—not to mention a multitude of seriously beneficial connections.
If everything Romney said in the soon-to-be infamous video was heard in context, he might make more sense. Of course, he might not. The Republican Party continually fails to offer more moderate voters an adequate supply of rational, intelligent candidates for fear of alienating the Religious Right. As is, portions of the video are spliced together, and the only consistency is the background noise. One can hear the pouring of wine or another drink, the clink of silverware against a plate, people moving and shifting, the sound of a chair scraping expensive tile, and all of this lends authenticity.
Whatever the true purpose of the video, Obama seems to have the support of many more wealthy people than Romney, if the figures from the Federal Election Commission can be believed. The difference between $348.4 and $193 million isn’t easily dismissed. Of course, plenty of politicians have cooked their books over the years, but it’s nice to know that Obama and Romney are making their well-done versions available online. Most people can’t handle rare meat. Power to the people.
References
“Campaign finance disclosure portal.” Federal Election Commission. (2012). http://www.fec.gov/
Corn, D. (2012). “Secret video: Romney tells millionaire donors what he really thinks of Obama voters.” Mother Jones. http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/09/secret-video-romney-private-fundraiser
Nagler, J. & Leighley, J. (1992). “Presidential campaign expenditures: Evidence on allocations and effects.” Public Choice. DOI: 10.1007/BF00140925
Ryssdal, K. (2012). “Does money buy elections?” Marketplace: Freakonomics Radio. http://www.marketplace.org/topics/elections/freakonomics-radio/does-money-buy-elections
Well apparently “There are 47 percent who are with [Obama], who are dependent on government, who believe that, that they are victims, who believe that government has the responsibility to care for them. Who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing.”(Romney)
Nice of you to add that. Its important to redirect conversation away from corruption in politics to the more important issue of how Romney sees Obama supporters. Great job, my furry logical fallacy supporter. I commend your ability to choose sides.
The funny part is that many of the lower 47% of income earners will be voting for Romney no matter how badly he screws up.
I’m also amused by this equivocation of official presidential campaign fundraising with overall campaign spending. Obama may have raised more money than Romney for his official campaign because he has more grassroots support and donors who don’t mind transparency. The Citizen’s United ruling, however, makes official campaign spending irrelevant. The notion that Obama supporters are going to outspend Romney supporters is ludicrous. The conservative SuperPACs are going to dump billions of dollars into this election, so they can avoid taxes and responsibility for negative externalities.
“Obama seems to have the support of many more wealthy people than Romney.” That would be marvelous if it were true because it would demonstrate that the wealthy don’t mind being part of a civilization and contributing to society as a whole. Somehow, though, I suspect that Romney’s backers will pull through and buy the White House for him.
By the way, I completely agree with your assessment of money and corruption in politics. Making the guy with the Cayman Islands and Swiss Bank accounts the victim is a nice trick, though.
http://fec.gov/disclosurep/pnational.do
Here’s the specific data referred to in the article. You’ll notice that Obama is outraising Romney most significantly in the $200 and under category. Romney is actually beating Obama in the $2000 and over category. Moreover, Obama is outraising Romney without accepting a cent from PACs–Romney has taken in over $800,000 from the PACs. In light of the data, I suspect Obama’s ace in the hole is not wealthy donors, but average donors. That’s a distinct advantage, because all the wealth in the world can’t increase the number of votes you can cast. (Though, nowadays, being poor can get you blocked from casting a vote at all)
Dionysus, I have to agree with you and your observation regarding Obama’s “ace in the hole” as being the “average” donors. Emails received from Team Obama over the past two weeks include requests for donations of such modest amounts as $1 or $5, and also challenges Obama supporters to achieve certain goals, such as receiving 600,000 donations (of any size) by midnight of that day. Part of Obama’s appeal is his ability to relate to the common citizen. If I came across him in a bar I wouldn’t think twice about sitting down and having a beer with him.
Some of our politicians are smooth criminals. Some aren’t. Recent Republican nominees don’t seem cut out for politics in the technological age. Verbal missteps become sound bites that can set off revolution, or at least protests, riots, and general unrest in the population at large. Obama has the right idea to gaining power in such a society because he plays his hand close to the vest, keeping his idiotic statements to a minimum, though he’s certainly not immune. Maybe Obama has more brains—he’s a cunning person, I’ll give him that. However, he may simply possess better handlers.
Have you considered that he may be genuinely intelligent, rather than merely ‘cunning’? I agree, I think he’s a brilliant tactician and manipulator of people’s opinions. I think that’s why he’s been as effective as he has in diplomacy and foreign policy.
Yes, I have considered that Obama is intelligent. He probably is, but I cannot tell his projected image from his true person, having never met him IRL. Therefore, I reserve judgment until that day, if it ever comes. Until then, I will consider the possibility that he’s just that good of a criminal, to have everyone believe so much in him. I’m really not ready to believe he is the one pure soul among all the criminals in Washington. However, his character really is beside the point. Mainly, I just make fun of him because no one else is willing to point anything out because he’s so popular. Call me the Devil’s advocate, except in my game, no one wins.
No one else is willing to point anything out? Really? Why have people spent so much time making things up, then? I usually keep my politics under my hat, but once a specific tone started to develop around here, I realized it would be disingenuous not to broaden the perspective.
I like your style, though. Devil’s advocates are in short supply.
By the way, I did finally figure out how to get the expense reports. Obama and Romney spend money quite differently. Obama’s expense report is nice, clean, and easy to access. I would say it’s a bit too clean because no one is that good at managing finances. All the dots are never in a row, and if Obama has someone on his staff who can perform miracles on his personal campaign finances, why in God’s name is Bernanke still in charge of the Fed?!
Romney’s expense report, on the other hand, looks frightening. Sorting through Obama’s data took two seconds, and I discovered that he’s spending roughly $687,000 on consultants, whereas Romney’s report took several minutes to reorganize before I discovered he’s spending roughly $25 million in consultant fees. Romney has a consultant for everything, but he’s wasting valuable resources.
Because you raised such a great point earlier, Dionysus, I took the trouble to look up a few figures on each candidate’s expenditure report since the official beginning of the campaign. Romney has spent $164,583,719.90, whereas Obama has spent $265,068,124.30. I got these figures from totaling the money each campaign has spent according to their expenditure reports, which I downloaded as an Excel file from the Federal Election Commission’s expenditure data download.
So, yes, Obama raised more and is spending more.
I never disagreed with that assessment. As far as personally raising money goes, Obama is much more charismatic and generally a better leader of men. He gets a lot of guff for being a community organizer, but that’s got to be good preparation for campaigning and politicking. Romney’s used to getting money from his dad to start businesses buying other businesses. His game is more the hostile takeover than small time fundraising.
My point was that the campaign is going to be largely determined by the independent Political Action Committees, with which the candidates do not coordinate. These entities can raise unlimited money and spend it however they wish. I need to get the data on the breakdown of conservative/liberal PACs, but I would be very surprised if Wall Street and the oil companies weren’t weighing in heavily for Romney.
Also, Bernanke has managed several rounds of major cash injection without a significant uptick in inflation. The economy and the credit markets have been sluggish because he was cautious, not because he did anything wrong.
How much does it cost to buy four years in the White House?
Now hold on fellas….I get what your saying, but doesn’t this whole video sort of derail the actual discussion? I noted a story about China, with little political content other than to point out how fortunate we are (and we are quite fortunate), a discussion of Romney’s personal finances, which I have neither desire nor ability to validate, condemnation of Obama over entitlement programs and foreign policy, and something vague and out of context about legal immigration. What I fail to see is how this pertains in any part to the actual issues.
Now, I don’t particularly like Mitt Romney, but I’m going to defend him for Truth’s sake.Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but what I got from the video, except for the odd statement about Anne and his grand-kids that was obviously out of context, was only a pittance of actual political value.
1) He believes America is great and blessed (duh), and that 95% of what we need for success is already in place. Yeah, maybe that number is a little high, but compared to Zimbabwe, we’re lookin’ pretty nice.
2) He considers himself as ‘one of us’, doesn’t like to think that he is any different because of his success, and prides himself on his work ethic and responsibility. Not anything particularly offensive, unless you happen to disagree with his viewpoint, but I refuse to comment.
Next, number 3) Although he feels that he was indeed ‘born with a silver spoon’, he also feels that he has worked for his fortune and also been generous with his inheritance (Hence, ‘giving it all away’), and thus subsequently feels his wealth and status was well-earned and well-deserved reward for his work. I don’t know his personal history and finance, and it isn’t really my place to judge without it. However, I do admire his apparent belief in capitalism and his obvious distaste of entitlement ideals.
4) A broad and rather offensive generalization of Obamites, in which he compares all who have or will vote for the President to whiny, incompetent, and entitled slackers who just want their welfare check. For some, this is certainly true, but I suspect a number of others will vote for Obama simply to avoid the possibility of a Republican candidate winning, which would result in greater social conservatism and increasingly hostile foreign policy.
5) a desire for a greater stability in foreign policy, and for a permanent station of troops in Iraq?
Now, I may have missed something, and if I did, please point it out. However, I think the ruckus over this tape, legit or not, only detracts from the real issue of ‘what is either candidate going to do while in office?’ I would rather have someone I dislike personally in office whose politics agreed with mine rather than someone charming and handsome whose politics I knew nothing about.
Chase says, “I suspect a number of others will vote for Obama simply to avoid the possibility of a Republican candidate winning, which would result in greater social conservatism. . . .”
I think you are correct on this point, Chase. The Republicans could very well slit their own throats over social issues. In fact, I think this is precisely what will happen, and it’s too bad, because deficit spending has and will continue to hurt the country’s chances for economic recovery, and Obama believes in deficit spending.
We will probably begin to see serious inflation within two years due in part to yet another round of quantitative easing. I’m concerned about the drought we’ve been suffering as well. Food prices will continue to rise, which means all sorts of other cost-of-living issues will make life more challenging for the middle class.
Sorry for the dismal outlook, but I have a feeling these things will come to pass. I hope I am wrong.